New apartments rising on the riverside at Nine Elms in Vauxhall, London. ‘The increase in land values is a direct result of the increase in density and building heights now permitted in planning approvals,’ writes David Graham.
Photograph: Alamy Stock Photo

Labour’s proposal to force cheap sales of land to the state for social housing (Report, 2 February) is laudable in so much as it identifies rocketing land values as the reason why social housing providers cannot compete with private developers, but it does not address the principal cause, which is the relaxation of planning guidelines over the past 20 years. This is no more evident than in London, where the Thames corridor skyline has sprouted a spiralling number of high-rise residential properties for sale, many of which are bought for investment rather than to provide homes.

This dramatic change can be traced back to the 1990s when planning densities were relaxed, so that it is now possible to see modest four-storey private estates built in the 1980s on the riverfront beside modern residential towers of 30 or more storeys. The increase in land values is a direct result of the increase in density and building heights now permitted in planning approvals, with developers claiming that the higher cost of land prevents them from providing the proportion of affordable homes that would otherwise be required. The way to bring down land values to a level where social housing providers can compete with private developers in the open market is to lower permitted residential densities. This would inevitably impact on the property investment market, but would increase the number of affordable homes available for rent or sale.David Graham (Architect) Richmond, Surrey

• There is an extraordinary irony in Labour’s demand for the forced sale of cheap land to the state. Even at the turn of this century we had tens of thousands of hectares of cheap land for housing which the state already owned on our behalf.

Over nearly two decades that land bank has been squandered by governments of all colours who sold it cheaply to developers in the mistaken belief that it would deliver both the numbers and the affordability that the Barker review of 2003 had hoped it would.

This process was accelerated massively by Labour policy in 2007 under Ruth Kelly, with the determination to dispose of huge quantities of land at almost nil cost to a small number of big developers. The Labour government of the day was arrogantly deaf to those of us pleading with them to look at other ways to use this huge public asset to deliver the affordable homes we needed.

The 1980 Housing Act forced the sale of publicly owned social housing without allowing the money from the sales to be used for building more houses. This has now been generally acknowledged as a fundamental mistake. The wholesale disposal of land already in public ownership is another.

So the idea of using cheap state land to deliver affordable housing is a great idea. The idea of Labour proposing the use of draconian compulsory purchase legislation to reclaim replacement land for that which it was determined to virtually give away throughout the whole of its last terms in office takes some swallowing.Robin HowellBurtle, Somerset

• The idea of land being bought by the state to enable genuinely affordable homes is not new. The new towns of the 1960s and 70s were financed by this model. Legislation allowed each (quango) development corporation to buy land at agricultural value, sell some on to private developers at housing land value, and use the uplift to build rental homes, schools, roads, etc. Hence the tens of thousands of homes built in those decades.

Nor is it unreasonable – the vast majority of rural land is worth agricultural value. It’s only a few lucky, or astute, landowners who get the vast uplift given by planning permission – which is given by a public authority.Moira HankinsonHenley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire

• I very much approve of Labour’s plans to buy land at valuations made before planning permission.

In fact, I would suggest that this should be the beginning of a movement to return to the public land that was legally stolen from us in the past. I would suggest repealing the Enclosure Acts of the 18th and 19th centuries by which landowners supported each others’ motions in parliament to acquire common land for their private use.

Once the land had been declared public property again there would be a number of ways of dealing with it. Some could be leased back to the present owners, for instance; some might find its way to the National Trust, other areas to local authorities. In every case, though, public access should be restored, although with due regard to privacy for those living and working there.Jim GrindleFormby, Merseyside

• It is an immense relief to read that the housing debate has at last embraced the free market in land that is at the root of so many of the UK’s troubles. The Haringey housing battle was about the people’s opposition to the powerful state and a powerful private developer joining forces to remove the land from under the homes of council tenants. Since 1979 an ideological free market approach to land has been forcing the UK back to the middle ages.

In the history of the parish of Fingest, which I served, is the story of Henry Burgersh. He was the grandson of a baron who became bishop of Lincoln; he claimed authority over the abbot of St Albans Abbey. In March 1130 the abbot made over to the bishop the manor of Fingest (Buckinghamshire) in return for a renunciation of all episcopal rights over the monastery. The bishop promptly enclosed 300 acres of common land on which 60 families depended for survival; it is recorded that they starved. The modern version is in the unlimited, unearned, untaxed increase in the value of land grabbed for private gain to the detriment of the common good.Rev Paul NicolsonTaxpayers Against Poverty